18-year-old charged in park rape case

John Pirro, Staff Writer

Updated 1:52 pm, Thursday, December 29, 2011

REDDING -- She said it was rape. He said the sex was consensual.

But because the girl that 18-year-old Charles J. O'Connor admitted having sex with at Huntington State Park in Redding was 15, the Fairfield teen faces charges of first-degree sexual assault and risk of injury to a minor.

O'Connor was arrested by Connecticut State Police on Tuesday evening and appeared Wednesday in state Superior Court in Danbury, where a judge issued a protective order barring him from contacting the alleged victim and continued the case to Jan. 18.

Police said the charges stem from an incident in the parking lot of the state park on the evening of July 22.

Both O'Connor and the girl said she went to the park with him voluntarily, but the girl told police that O'Connor, who she said appeared intoxicated, raped her after she refused to have sex with him, according to the arrest warrant affidavit.

O'Connor told troopers they went to the park twice, the first time on the night before the alleged rape, the second on the evening the girl claims she was assaulted, investigators said in the affidavit.

O'Connor said they had consensual sex on both occasions, but said they stopped on the second night after the condom broke, police said.

O'Connor also said he "did not think he raped" the girl, police said.

Investigators also interviewed friends of the girl, who said she told them about the alleged rape shortly after it happened. Investigators said one of the friends later confronted O'Connor, who allegedly admitted assaulting the girl, according to the affidavit.

Troopers also obtained several text messages that O'Connor and the victim exchanged after the incident, although the substance of the messages was not detailed in the arrest warrant affidavit.

Investigators said the girl didn't tell her mother about the incident for nearly a week, but after the mother learned of the alleged assault, she contacted police.